Icy road conditions claim 4 more lives in Kansas

Andover  Authorities in Kansas are blaming four more traffic deaths in the Wichita area on the icy conditions gripping the state and other parts of the nation's midsection.

Icy roads caused a Friday afternoon rollover crash that killed two teenage passengers about 10 miles southeast of Newton, Harvey County sheriff's Corp. Tim Boese said. The driver was transported from the scene in serious condition. The names of the victims weren't immediately released.

The crash was among five rollovers accident Friday and Saturday in the county, Boese said. He said authorities also responded to numerous accidents involving vehicles sliding off roads.

The Kansas Turnpike Authority said two other people were killed Friday when a Ford truck jackknifed and struck an SUV on an icy stretch of Interstate 35 near Andover. The crash killed the SUV's driver, Shirley Ann Starr, 65, of Kansas City, Mo., and a truck passenger, Arlene Dale Harrison, 60, of Winnipeg, in the Canadian province of Manitoba.

Four others were injured in the crash, two critically and two seriously, said Kevin Worrell, the shift supervisor for the Butler County Emergency Communication's Office. The weather also caused a power outage that left about half the county in the dark, but the electricity had been mostly restored by Saturday.

Authorities previously blamed two traffic deaths Thursday in the western part of the state on the wintry storm system moving through the Plains and Midwest. Officials in Texas have blamed at least eight deaths on the storms since Thursday.